JACLYN DAB
INSTASPACE
Market Research + Marketing + Product Innovation
How might we take the experiences people seek from Instagram and come up with a new, value generating offering?
InstaSpace is a new offering that provides millennial women with a venue for self-expression. It does so by providing creation, beauty, and community through the use of a mobile app, activities for creating, beautiful finished products, and in-person interactions with other creatives. It's a two-sided platform connecting active creatives.
Course: Market Insight - MBA in Design Strategy, CCA
Role:
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I worked on a team with three classmates and played a significant and extensive role on the project by helping to formulate the basic stakeholder interview questionnaire
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I facilitated an ideation session to come up with viable new products or services based on the research findings.
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I collaboratively led the content strategy for the presentation report in order to effectively tell the story of how we arrived at our recommendations for Instagram and to communicate our marketing plan.
Tools/Frameworks:
Street Intercepts
Market Research
Ideation
Brand Strategy
Experience Strategy
CHALLENGE
Investigate the key experiences people seek from a company and come up with a new offering that leverages those experiences to build deeper relationships and generate a new, profitable revenue stream.
My team chose to use Instagram for this project.
Target Market
Design Thinking Facilitation
Storytelling
Need-finding
Pattern-finding
Millennial women ages 18-34 who are creatives: designers, artists, makers, photographers, creative thinkers, etc.
UNDERSTAND
Research Methods
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Primary Research
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Street Intercepts
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Qualitative
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Secondary Research
Background
people worldwide use Instagram every month
people worldwide use Instagram every day
of Instagram users are women
of Instagram users
are between 18-29 years old
of women in the U.S. aged 25-54 report spending more time on Instagram now than 6 months ago
Current Touchpoints
Street Intercepts
We conducted 15 street incercepts in total, I was responsible for 6 of them. We interviewed 11 millennial woman in San Francisco at the Contemporary Jewish Museum, CCA, a bar in the Mission, Yerba Buena Gardens, and four millennial women in Venice, CA at Abbot Kinney.
Key Findings:
Through the research we identified five experiences sought from Instagram: Beauty, Community, Validation, Creation, and Wonder.
Beauty
Beauty is often subjective, but we find most users seek it, albeit in different ways. We found that users capture and share what they perceive as beautiful and they create/edit or search for something elegant or aesthetically pleasing
Instagram users seek a sense of unity and connection with other human beings. This is primarily derived from building a network of followers/members followed, and having the opportunity to exchange with them.
Community
Recognition is a key part of the Instagram experience. Users experience validation via likes, comments, shares and follows.
Validation
We identified creation as a form of self-expression as one of the experiences derived from Instagram. This manifests in the form of deliberate photography, use of filters, and curating a gallery.
Creation
Wonder is part of the Instagram experience in how it can make users feel transported to another place and users have access to awe-inspiring images and creations. Users use hashtags, geo-tags, or follow celebrities and brands to obtain a sense of wonder.
Wonder
Segments
Based on the combination of experiences users seek from Instagram, there are four segments: Archivist, Creative, Flaunter, and Researcher.
Experiences: Community, Beauty
Archivist Segment
Characteristics:
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Searches hashtags and geo-tags to research places to visit/eat
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Views photos of handbags interior design, and other for ideas of things to buy
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Views photos of places
Experiences: Creation, Beauty, Community
Creative Segment
Characteristics
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Edited photos
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Artistic, beautiful photos
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Consistent, curated look/feel
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Gallery as personal image
Researcher Segment
Experiences: Wonder, Beauty
Characteristics
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Searches hashtags and geo-tags to research places to visit/eat
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Views photos of handbags interior design, and other for ideas of things to buy
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Views photos of places
Flaunter Segment
Experiences: Validation, Community, Beauty
Characteristics
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Posts photos of achievements, gifts, cool places they’ve been, themselves, and accessories
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“Like” count is important
IDEATE
Opportunities
After researching each segment, we had an ideation session where we thought of potential new offerings that leverage the experiences each segment looks for in Instagram.
Archivist
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Improve features on Instagram app to enable sorting and searching posts - no new product offering recommendation.
Creative
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Provide opportunities to network with other creatives
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Provide opportunities for users to create beautiful things besides posts
Researcher
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Enhance users’ ability to find new things and places
Flaunter
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Provide users other ways to affirm their identity aside from sharing photos
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Provide opportunities for people to connect in real life
We came up with several potential solutions, including InstaSpace, InstaView, and InstaFest
InstaSpace
Segment: Creative
Experiences:
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Creation: Place to make things and learn new art & design skills
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Beauty: Visually pleasing space with Instagram look/feel
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Community: Members-only collaborative space for creative people
Characteristics
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Membership fee
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Coffee/Food sales
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Co-working space
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Creative workshops
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Maker equipment
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Images from Instagram on the walls like a gallery
Experiences:
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Wonder: Users can explore new and inspiring places and things
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Beauty: Find beautiful places
Instaview
Segment: Researcher
Characteristics
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Interactive map
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Search by interest or location
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Find people to follow and places to go
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Recommendations
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Reviews
Instafest
Segment: Flaunter
Experiences:
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Validation: Recognition by being invited to an exclusive event
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Community: Part of a members-only group
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Beauty: Visually and culturally rich surroundings
Characteristics
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Tickets only open to members
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Place to be seen
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Cultural: art, music, and theater
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Global: can be adapted to multiple contexts and locations
Topline
To validate InstaSpace, I put together a brief and asked millennial women (the target market) several questions, including, "Would Instagram be credible if it offered InstaSpace?"
Check out the InstaSpace Marketing Plan and go-to-market strategy.
InstaSpace exists to provide millennial women with a venue for self-expression. It does so by providing creation, beauty, and community through the use of the mobile app, activities for creating, beautiful finished products, and in-person interactions with other creatives. It's a two-sided platform connecting active creatives.
InstaSpace’s mission is to enrich lives by connecting millennial women to opportunities where they can practice creativity beyond the digital world and experience creation, beauty, and community.
